I’ve been playing a lot of Horizon 1 recently and with many of the features to reappear in the second game I got to thinking of how the game world itself operates. To me at least, it seems as though the day/night cycles come too quickly. The passage of time is so rapid, that it would appear that the Horizon Festival has been going on continuously for months! In Forza time it takes all night to drive just a few miles. Would slowing the day/night cycle be beneficial to the game? The speed of time also has an effect on weather. Will weather in the game pass much too quickly as well?
Also, in observing the people who populate the game world. In various areas of the map, they appear to be in a state of non stop party 24-7 at every and all outpost and race start signup. Would it be possible that in future games, that the crowds be more numerous at certain times of the day or days of the week when headlining acts would be playing the festival? Take the racing for example. You can show up at a signup at 2am, and there will be 30 people there no matter what time. Sign up and the event takes place the next day with concrete barricades which magically appear. Would it be more believable to encounter a sparsely inhabited station at night, but then much more crowded the day of the race? The festival zone itself is lined with hundreds of people who stand about for the duration of the festival, don’t move or change in number.
I know many will say, but it’s Forza, it’s too complex for all that and give a list of features which must be too complicated to add anything else upon. With next gen tech, I don’t see how this isn’t possible.
I agree what with you said. think what Playground/T10 was trying to do is make it a non-stop party all night, and I think that having at the festival at night it’s real, but at a race sign up or at a outpost at 4 am? Nobody is going to be there. Also I think that the night should be just as long as the day. it is literally like 10 min. when the day is like 30! As for the festival races, it makes sense that they would put in boundaries. IRL they do that too. I also thin k the people should be more alive imo. Walking and stuff like that. I’ve been playing this game now for months and i drive around and it’s party party party, which is cool at first cause it has that summer feel, but months, years later when you finish the game like me and are driving around and you see people jumping up and down 100+ times, it its kinda like… oh. They literally move an inch, smile, and move back. For me, the festival was cool, but the people didn’t give me the festival feeling. In the Xbone version there will be no story but of the 360 version, i think the characters should be more in depth. They insult you, and you beat them, street races them, they apologize, and its done. Also the Djs are like “___ will be competing the the ___ wristband events” which doesn’t make sense. aren’t you supposed to start from the bottom and level up? I have another post elsewhere about the Djs, but they need to STOP repeating things.
The people are stereotypical also:
-Douche-y male (D. Flynt)
-Snobby rich foreign male (I forget his name but he was a prince)
-Random Girl-powered “I’ll-beat -your-***- but-i’m-at-the-bottom” girl
and so on. We should, I think, that you should make friends, or at least know more about them.
I think its impossible to offer a day/night cycle that pleases everyone, me for instance Id rather have no night at all.
Imo the smart thing to do for the Devs would be to add user settings for both time and weather. Like “realistic”, 2x, 4x, 8x, “always day”, “always night” etc…
Would be cool to have a option to have the day night cycle sync up with your real world time. I’d be driving at night a lot since I work 3rd shift. Lol.
To me, the Horizon games are about more than racing on a track. They are about immersing you in their world. The day/night cycle should in my opinion be lengthened to support this premise. Last night I spent a few minutes at the end of the night drifting and fooling around, and I swear the night cycle lasted less than 10 minutes. The previewed weather options should also last for a correspondingly longer time period. Of course this may mean that it will rain or be cloudy/overcast for longer periods of time, but you can’t expect every rain shower in the game to pass in a minute or two. We know very little about how the weather systems will pass with time, but I am assuming they are dialed in to regional weather patterns and the actual time required for fronts to pass, clouds to gather, rain events to take place, etc. with the gathering of water on the road surface and drying of the pavement with the sun vs. night.
In other Forza games, the maps seem to have a constant map temperature every time they are played. How many of you noticed that the Bernese Alps in FM4 is ALWAYS 24 degrees? Temperature as an environmental factor should fluctuate during the day. Cold weather and cooler pavement having a differing effect on your tires and handling than hot, dry weather.
As stated above, the people which populate the game world should be more numerous during the day and prior to race starts than in the pre-dawn hours. Also, it would not seem believable if they were to always wear the same things. I doubt the bikini/hot pants combo from FH1 would be happening in the pre-dawn hours of a cold Italian morning. The people should also move in some way and gather in places where people actually would.
Also, with the millions of credits that many players accrue in this game, would it be possible at some point to purchase a structure in game to house your vehicles with perhaps a chosen 10 or 20 being viewable in the garage space (and not just as a menu selection like all other Forza games). This would bring incentive to work towards a larger goal and give a sense of accomplishment being able to tour your cars and perhaps get in one AutoVista style (although not with the same level of detail).
In short, these and other ideas could help to create a more immersive Horizon game world. Call me weird but I for one, don’t just race in this game, and find it relaxing just to drive the roads in different cars.
I agree! Being that it’s a festival, I don’t know how it would work, but it would be great to buy a garage space or even a house. It would be a very good add on to the already good premise of the game.
I agree. With making a more realistic world, it could feel like you are really there. Now they can’t do that (walking around, people changing clothes to fit the weather, more realistic weather (even though we haven’t seen it yet)), but by Horizon 4 or 5, that could happen on next-next gen tech.
Exactly, you should change clothes. No one is going to stay at an OUTPOST for 24 hours.